American science-fiction writer, who became
famous with his ecological novel Dune
(1965), set in Arrakis, a world of giant sandworms. The epic adventure
won the first Nebula for Best Novel, shared the Hugo, and gained a cult
status. Herbert's bestseller was followed by five sequels. Often
Herbert's stories dealt with great cycles of development, environmental
as well as cultural. Many critics have noted that Dune could be
read as an allegory about the oil politics of the Middle East, equating
the fictional drug, the spice mélange of Arrakis, to oil.

"The effect of Arrakis is on the
mind of the newcomer usually that of overpowering barren land. The
stranger might think nothing could live or grow in the open here, that
this was the true wasteland that had never been fertile and never would
be."(Dune, 1965)

Frank Herbert, Jr., was born in Tacoma, Washington. At that
time his father, Frank Herbert, known as "F.H.", operated an auto-bus
line between Tacoma and Aberdeen to the south. Later he worked as an
electrical equipment salesman, automobile salesman, motorcycle
patrolman. In 1928 the family moved to Burley to a small farm.

Herbert graduated from Salem High School in 1939 and began his
career as a journalist. During World War II served in the U.S. Navy as
a Photographer Second Class V-6 in the Naval Reserve. In 1943 he was
given an early honorable discharge. He then worked for two years as a
copy editor for the Oregon Journal in Portland, Oregon.

In 1941 Herbert married Flora Parkinson, a teenager. They
divorced in 1945; next year he married Beverly Ann Stuart, whom he had
met in a creative writing class. In 1946-47 Herbert studied at the
University of Washington, Seattle. By late 1947 he was employed as a
feature writer for the Tacoma Times. Herbert was a reporter and
editor on a number of West Coast newspapers and wrote speeches for
politicians. In 1972 Herbert worked in Vietnam and Pakistan as a social
and ecological studies consultant. From 1970 to 1972 he was a lecturer
in general and interdisciplinary studies at the University of
Washington. Herbert also wrote, directed, and produced the television
documentary 'The Tillers', which was based on his field work with Roy
Prosterman in Pakistan, Vietnam and other countries.

His first sf story, 'Looking for Something', Herbert sold to Startling
Stories. However, editor after editor rejected his early fiction.
During the next decade, he still continued as an infrequent contributor
to science fiction magazines, producing fewer than 20 short pieces. As
a novelist Herbert started with The
Dragon in the Sea (1955). Originally it was published in
serialized form in Astounding under the title Under Pressure.
The futuristic submarine thriller predicted worldwide conflicts over
oil consumption and production. Dune World was first published
in Analog (December 1963-February 1964), with illustrations by
John Schoenherr. Before the work appeared in book form, Herbert rewrote
much of his text.

In Dune Herbert plunged into an alien future centered
around a complex interplanetary civilization. First rejected by nearly
twenty publishers, the book eventually sold over 12 million copies, was
translated into several languages, including Finnish and Swedish, and
was adapted for the screen. Its idea date in the late 1950s when
Herbert studied a governmental ecological project designed to halt the
spread of sand dunes on the Oregon coastline. Inside a frame of an
entertaining Space Opera, Herbert examined several themes – the
development of psi powers, intergalactic politics, religion (especially
Zen Buddhism), functions of an alien ecosystem, and messianism. In the
first part the reader meets Paul Atreides, the outsider hero and future
Messiah. His adventures follow the logic of Hans Christian Andersen's
fairy tale 'The Ugly Duckling', in which natural talents triumph over
ostracism and hostile environment.

--"Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a man's
mind," Paul quoted. --"Right out
of the Butlerian Jihad and the Orange Catholic Bible," she said.

Paul is the son of Duke Leto and his concubine Jessica,
members of the House of Atreides, who are opposed by the Harkonnes. He
undergoes a painful initiation at the hands of a reverend mother, who
is member of the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood. (As models for the
Sisterhood Herbert used his Irish Catholic maternal aunts, who had
attempted to force religion on him in his childhood.) With Jessica Paul
escapes a Harkonnen plot. In the second part Paul finds his true self
in the sand planet Arrakis, where the citizens, the Fremen, live like
Bedouins in the desert and ride on huge, deadly sandworms. Their secret
is that the worms are the sole source of Melange, a spice that is
necessary for interstellar travel and grants psychic powers and extends
life. Paul takes the Fremen name 'Muad'Dib'. Part three describes
Paul's way to power, foretold by the Bene Gesserit Order. He rides a
sandworm and drinks the Water of Life, a poisonous but mind-altering
drug. Along the saga Atreides makes his metamorphosis into a kind of
god, his destiny culminating in God
Emperor of Dune (1981), "perhaps the least complex of the Dune
novels in its plotting, yet all the more satisfying for that." (Brian Aldiss & David Wingrove in Trillion Year Spree, 2001).

The film version of Dune (1984) was produced by Dino
De Laurentiis and directed by David Lynch, starring Kyle MacLachlan as
Paul Atreides, with Francesca Annis, Kenneth McMillan, Sting, Sean
Young. The screenplay was also written by David Lynch, who struggled to
build up a coherent story line and managed to produce a draft which
Herbert accepted. However, one of the crucial changes was that Paul
seeks to "conquer" the sand-dwelling worm, instead of riding on top of
the monster in a symbiotic act. Before this production Lynch had made Eraserhead
(1976) and The Elephant Man (1980), both acclaimed by
critics. Dune was considered failure – especially it was mocked
by U.S. critics, though in Japan and Europe it found success."...
even Lynch's trademark touches cannot fully compensate for perhaps the
film's gravest weakness: the simplification of the key
characterizations. Paul's (Kyle MacLachlan) seizure of the emperor's
throne lacks the ambivalent tone presented in the novel. Herbert's deep
suspicion of messianic fervor makes Paul's victory far less triumphant
than Lynch would have his audience believe." (Novels into Films by John C.
Tibbetts and James M. Welsh, 1997) Lynch's next movie, Blue
Velvet (1986), and the television series Twin Peaks restored
his fame as one of the most original modern directors. A new and more
thorough adaptation of Dune was a made by John Harrison, who
wrote and directed a three part television mini-series (2000), starring
Alec Newman, Saskia Reeves, Barbora Kodetová, Julie Cox, William Hurt,
Giancarlo Giannini, Ian McNeice.

All of the novels in the series focused on relations between
individuals in conflict over political power. Another central theme was
the effects of an ecological disaster on an interplanetary scale. In Dune Messiah (1969) the central
problem is Paul's wish to have an ordinary family life with his beloved
Chani. The famed editor John W. Campbell, Jr., rejected this volume
because it undermined the heroic image of Paul Atreides. "While writing
the third Dune book," Herbert said, "I first realized
consciously that I had to be entertainer above all, that I was in the
entertainment business." The planet Arrakis is becoming desert again in
Heretics of Dune (1984),
sandworms are dying, and the children of Dunes children practice the
new power of a heresy called love. Chapterhouse:
Dune (1985) ended the series. Arrakis has been destroyed. The
heirs to Dune's power have colonized a green world, and they are
turning it into a homely desert. But power corrupts: -"Isn't it odd, Dama..." No reaction;
continue. "... how rebels all too soon fall into old patterns if
they are victorious? It's not so much a pitfall in the path of all
governments as it is a delusion waiting for anyone who gains power."(from Chapter
House Dune)

Herbert's other works include Hellstrom's Hive (1973), in which a
human hive has evolved through centuries in North America. In this
society the individual's existence is of minor importance. The Dosadi Experiment (1977) was a
spy thriller set in a universe populated by several conflicting alien
races. Additional themes are psi powers and total mind transference. The White Plague (1982) was about a
madman, who creates a disease that kills only women.

Until 1972, when he began to write full-time, Herbert
published socially engaged science fiction. He divided his time between
his house on the island of Maui, Hawaii, and farm in Olympic Peninsula,
Washington State, where he developed his "ecological demonstration
project". After the death of his wife in 1984, Herbert married Theresa
Shackleford. In the 1970s and 80s' Herbert worked with Bill Ransom
(1945-), and published with him The Pandora trilogy – The Jesus Incident (1979), The Lazarus Effect (1983), and The Ascension Factor (1988), which
explored the relationship between God-"protected" human stock and the
natives of Pandora. Herbert died of massive pulmonary embolism on
February 12, 1986, after a long treatment for cancer. He left behind
extensive notes about Dune and in 1999 appeared a prequel to
the series, Dune: House Atreides,
written by Brian Herbert, Frank Herbert's son, in collaboration with
Kevin J. Anderson. Brian has also published with his father Man of Two Worlds (1986) and edited
other Herbert's works. Dreamer of Dune: The Biography of Frank
Herbert by Brian Herbert, came out in 2003.

For further
reading:Herbert's Dune and Other Works by Louis David Allen (1975); Frank
Herbert by David M. Miller (1980); Frank Herbert by Timothy O'Reilly
(1981); The Dune Encyclopedia, ed. Willis E. McNelly (1984); Frank
Herbert by William F. Touparce (1988); A Frank Herbert Bibliography by
Daniel J.H. Levack (1988); The Notebooks of
Frank Herbert, ed. Brian Herbert (1988); Dreamer
of Dune: The Biography of Frank Herbert by Brian Herbert (2003)